The identity of the patient-looking sitter is unknown. Modigliani might have chosen her because she was a compatriot. Most of the artist's models were not professionals, except those he hired for his pictures of female nudes.

London. Royal Academy of Arts. "Modigliani and His Models," July 8–October 15, 2006, no. 22.

References

Edward Alden Jewell. "New Season Opens in Local Galleries." New York Times (October 6, 1929), p. X12 [possibly this picture], describes "L'Italienne" in Exh. New York 1929 as having "one of the familiar long, oval faces, the long neck, the narrow, sloping shoulders, the eyes that are almond slits".

Charles Sterling and Margaretta M. Salinger. French Paintings: A Catalogue of the Collection of The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Vol. 3, XIX–XX Centuries. New York, 1967, pp. 241–42, ill., comment that "it would be interesting to identify her with Rosalia, an Italian who kept a little restaurant in the Rue Campagna-Première, where Modigliani was one of her favorites".

Nello Ponente. Modigliani. New York, 1969, p. 34, colorpl. 47, calls it "Portrait of a Woman" and dates it 1917–18.

Lowery S. Sims inTreasures from The Metropolitan Museum of Art: French Art from the Middle Ages to the Twentieth Century. Exh. cat., Yokohama Museum of Art. Tokyo, 1989, p. 202, no. 164, ill. (color), notes that this sitter was not a professional model or member of Modigliani's immediate circle.

Marc Restellini inExposition Amedeo Modigliani au Japon. Exh. cat., Tobu Museum of Art. Tokyo, 1992, pp. 124–25, 204, no. 36, ill. (color), dates it 1918; states that it was painted in Nice, as a pendant to a portrait of a man called "Le Niçois" (private collection; Patani 1991, no. 300; Parisot 1991, no. 24/1919), citing the sitters' similar composure, black clothing, and the green band along the right side of both pictures; surmises that the sitters were connected in some way, similar to Italian pendant portraits of the sixteenth century.